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The sleepless stress of a troubled star

Tributes to Heath Ledger outside his SoHo apartment building in Manhattan. The crowd watch as a body bag is brought out of the block and his parents and sister make a statement about the tragedy. Photos AP and AFP

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LESS than three months ago, Heath Ledger described his sleepless
nights and mental exhaustion as he wrestled with his role as the
"psychopathic, mass-murdering, schizophrenic" Joker in the new
Batman film.

One night he took a sleeping pill, Ambien, to little effect. He
took a second, slept for an hour, but then woke, his mind
racing.

"Last week I probably slept an average of two hours a night,"
Ledger told The New York Times.

"I couldn't stop thinking. My body was exhausted, and my mind
was still going," he said, while admitting he also "stressed out a
little too much" about his role in the Bob Dylan film I'm Not
There.

Yesterday, the 28-year-old Australian film star was found dead,
face-down and naked at the foot of his bed in his rented SoHo
apartment in Manhattan. There were prescription drugs, including
sleeping pills, by his bed.

Only hours earlier, his Australian co-star in I'm Not
There, Cate Blanchett, was nominated for two Academy
Awards.

Despite wide speculation about suicide, nobody yet knows what
killed Ledger, or what part drugs played. In Perth, his family
insisted the death was accidental. It is understood they will
arrange for his body to be flown home where he will be laid to
rest.

Ambien is marketed in Australia as Stilnox, and has been linked
with dangerous side effects. More than 500 people responded to a
national drug reactions hotline last year, reporting bizarre
behaviour after taking the drug. Two months ago, Australia's
medicines regulator ordered that packs of Stilnox carry warnings
that the drug can cause people to walk, eat, drive or have sexual
intercourse in their sleep. They now also warn Stilnox can cause
rage reactions, confusion, agitation and hallucinations.

In Manhattan, police said the type of sedative found in Ledger's
apartment was uncertain. Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne said the
actor had an appointment for a massage at the apartment and his
housekeeper found him unconscious about 3.30pm when she went to
notify him of the masseur's arrival. He was unresponsive and
pronounced dead shortly after. Mr Browne stressed that the cause of
death would not be known until determined by a medical
examiner.

Mr Browne denied early reports that pills were scattered about
the floor.

The TMZ.com website quoted representatives of Ledger's family as
saying police had advised them his death was entirely accidental.
He was not a suicidal type, they had said. The website added that
an unnamed family member said Ledger was ill with pneumonia. Police
could not confirm this.

Ledger split last year from Michelle Williams, who played his
wife in Brokeback Mountain, for which he received an Oscar
nomination for his role as a gay cowboy. The couple had a daughter,
Matilda, and lived together in Brooklyn until their separation.

The Perth model Sophie Ward, whose supermodel sister Gemma was
romantically linked with Ledger during his trip home to spend
Christmas with his family, told The West Australian that
Ledger appeared troubled when the trio spent time together. "We
went to the movies and just did normal stuff but he was a
bit edgy," said Ms Ward, 22. "He couldn't really relax."

She said he was anxious and distressed about his relationship
breakdown and separation from Williams, but she did not believe
claims he was battling drug problems.

She believed his recent problems stemmed from those relationship
issues. "He said he was going to London but was quite upset because
he couldn't see his daughter as much as he'd like to," she
said.

It is understood Ledger's family heard of his death from a radio
report yesterday morning. His parents, Kim and Sally, and sister
Kate emerged from his mother's home in the Perth suburb of
Attadale.

Mr Ledger read a brief statement about the "very tragic,
untimely and accidental passing of our dearly loved son, brother
and doting father of Matilda". He had been found "peacefully
asleep".

"Heath has touched so many people on so many different levels
during his short life that few had the pleasure of truly knowing
him. He was a down-to-earth, generous, kind-hearted, life-loving
and selfless individual who was extremely inspirational to
many.

"Please now respect our family's need to grieve and come to
terms with our loss privately."

As recently as last week Ledger's career seemed to be continuing
its upward trajectory: he was in London filming The Imaginarium
of Doctor Parnassus, directed by Monty Python's Terry
Gilliam.

Blanchett said in a statement: "I'm thrilled by the [Oscar]
nominations but more profoundly saddened by the loss of Heath. I
deeply respected his work and always admired his continuing
development as an artist. My thoughts are with his family and close
friends."

In SoHo, hundreds of media and onlookers gathered outside
Ledger's five-storey loft building. It was the kind of attention
that infuriated Ledger in life.

A woman craned out of the window of an adjacent building to
photograph Ledger's shrouded body as it was wheeled to an
ambulance. Dozens more tried to capture the moment on mobile phone
cameras. Across the street a boy, barely into his teens, shouted:
"I got it. I got it on video!"

Only once the morbidly curious drifted into the night did there
seem to be a moment of simple compassion.

A Perth woman, Daleen Kupsch, 31, now living in lower Manhattan,
said she had grown up in Morley, a couple of suburbs away from
Ledger's home of Guildford. He had only recently been a popular
visitor to the Guildford Hotel.

"I am a big fan. I feel so sorry for his little girl. I just saw
him and his little girl the other day. He seemed so happy."

And he was, apparently. In an interview about I'm Not
There with WJW-TV, Ledger struck a philosophical note when
asked how having a child had changed his life: "You're forced into,
kind of, respecting yourself more. You learn more about yourself
through your child, I guess. I think you also look at death
differently. It's like a catch 22: I feel good about dying now
because I feel like I'm alive in her, you know, but at the same
hand, you don't want to die because you want to be around for the
rest of her life."

Tributes to Heath Ledger outside his SoHo apartment building in Manhattan. The crowd watch as a body bag is brought out of the block and his parents and sister make a statement about the tragedy. Photos AP and AFP

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